THE MAGIC OF TRAVEL

The question is not should I travel, it is what are the benefits. In this episode we look at the benefits of travel.

Transcript

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Well, good morning. It is the 11th of May 2026. And straight from the High Lake Caffeinator studio, this is According to Willie B. And today we're going to talk about the magic of travel. Now, the first thing I'm going to tell you is that when I was seven years old, I first saw magic. I'm not talking about magic tricks. I'm not talking about movie magic. I'm talking about real magic. Let's get into it. All right. So if you think about magic, when it comes to experiencing something, I was seven years old, so think about looking at something through the eyes of a seven-year-old child. We traveled quite extensively in my family growing up. Most of it was in the South. We never traveled outside of the U.S. growing up. But I remember that we went to Florida a lot because my dad fished a tournament trail that you probably may or may not know as the BASS tournament trail. So he fished in that. So we went to Florida quite extensively. In 1972, I'm seven years old. Disney World had just been in operation in Florida for just over a year. Now you have to understand that there was a bubble back then. Take out all your social media that didn't exist. People didn't have cell phones to be aware of Disneyland over in California. Because if you hadn't traveled to California, you really probably hadn't heard much about Disneyland. You might have heard about it. You might have seen something on TV, but you hadn't experienced it. Seven-year-old child walks into Disney World. A whole different venue than had ever been seen before. Technology that had never been seen before. There was only the magic kingdom. There was not Epcot. There was no big silver spear. There was none of that. Just the Magic Kingdom. And they named it correctly because it was this main street of magic, if you will. They had and still have, but they had uh your like the tiki birds they that were animatronic birds. They had the It's a Small World things, things of rides of that nature, things that never had not been seen. And through the eyes of a seven-year-old child, this was magic. And this is what gave me my first inclination of that travel was magic, that all travel should be this way. That wherever you went in the world, that that magic should be there waiting on you. Because I can tell you, as a seven-year-old child walking down Main Street in the Magic Kingdom, it was like a whole different world that you had never experienced before. And those memories, even though I was seven years old, are ingrained in my heart and my brain from now on. I hope. Travel is about making memories with those that mean the most to you, whether it be your spouse, whether it be your family, whether it be your grandparents, a best friend, doesn't matter. It's about going and making memories. And even if you travel by yourself, regardless, go and make those memories. I can tell you that my wife and I, our favorite thing to do is spontaneous road trips. And we both love those because there's a lot of elements in a spontaneous road trip that a lot of travel doesn't have. Number one, it gives you time in a car where you have time to talk, uninterrupted. No telephones ringing, no emails, none of that. You just have each other, and you can be able to reconnect in those moments and talk about the things that you see as you go down the road in uncharted territory. So that's why I love spontaneous road trips. They always have some of the most incredible memories for me. Because there's always something, not always something, but a lot of times something can go not necessarily wrong, but it may go sideways because it's spontaneous and it's unplanned. So you have to really expect that something is going to get in kind of a twist, and you got to be able to pivot at that moment and make it into something great. So let me tell you about a second part of this: the illusion of travel. Someone asked me as much as we travel, and I've been very blessed in the amount of travel I've got to do in my life. And it's a lot, and I'm I never take not one minute of it for granted. I've had people ask me, do you regret any travel you've ever done? I said, Absolutely not. I will never regret traveling anywhere, but I will regret the trips that I didn't get to take. And here's what I mean by that. I lost both of my parents in my 40s. I lost both of them to cancer. They both loved to travel, and they had a list that they wanted to go and see and do, and they didn't get to finish that list. And my heart hurt for them because they didn't get to go make those memories. So at that point, I realized that travel has a clock, it has a timeline. So you've seen the joke or the meme on social media that says, you know, hey, I realize what all's going on in life, but you know, buy the shoes, eat the cake, yada yada. You've you've seen that. And there's some truth to that. Now, I'm not saying give up, you know, go spend your mortgage payment or go spend your car payment or go spend your life savings. I'm not saying that at all. I'm not saying be irresponsible. I'm saying be aware, not afraid, be aware of the clock that's ticking, because we don't know how much time we have. But just be aware that there is a clock, and the perfect time to go is now, even if it's just across the state or across town or whatever, because life has a timeline. Now, I realize that's kind of heavy, but I want you to understand something. I'm trying to drive home the point of why travel means so much to me. And and I get it that some people don't share this same love for travel. I understand that, and I understand why. I can't fathom that in my own brain, but I respect that person that says I that travel is not for me. But I understand that life has a timeline and I have places that I want to go see, and I need to go see them now. Because guess what? When I I get back from travel, of all the times I've traveled, I can tell you one consistent thing that has always been there when I get back from a trip. When I return from a trip, there's always one constant. The bills are still laying on the table, the job is still there, the problems that I had before I left are still there. Everything that was haunting my mind before I left on that trip is still right there where I left them when I come back. They haven't gone anywhere. But now I have memories of seeing and experiencing things, and whether it be other cultures or whatever it is, I have those experiences and they begin to soften those issues and stuff in life that I had before I left. So it provides this coding around them where they're not quite so brutal because I can sit and think of the time that I just had on that trip instead of focusing on how am I going to pay this bill or I've got this problem at work or that problem at work. And guess what? Those problems will still be there when you get back. But I've had people say it's just not the right time. And if if it is due to money issue, I get it. I've been there. But if it's just because, well, I just, you know, I want to wait until this thing happens at work or until we get this done at work, or until, you know, and I don't know everybody's, I'm just telling you, eat the cake, buy the shoes, take the trip. So let's talk about the cost of travel because this always is the first thing that somebody will talk to me about. It's like, ah, you know, I understand what you're saying about the travel, and I agree with you, but man, the the cost of travel. I just talked to a friend at work the other day, and he was talking about a trip that they want to take, and it's in the U.S. And he says, Man, we we had planned for over a year to to fly out there and and do this. And he said, the price of air travel now, he said, I just simply can't afford it. He said, it's double my mortgage payment for for the our family of four to go. And I said, I totally understand. I didn't understand as much until I started researching for this podcast and really diving into all these costs out there, and it's insane. Lodging, when you when you do get there, whether you drove or whether you flew or you took the train, lodging is more expensive. I can easily remember it's not too far back in the past where you could get a decent hotel for $80, $75. Now you got to add $100 to that. Oh, and if you go on Expedia and you find a hotel room for $125, it looks pretty good. When you get through adding all the taxes, fees, and surcharges, you're at $150. I'm like, where are all these fees coming from? And it's insanity. You know, attractions are becoming more expensive. One of the most expensive, I think, in my own brain, overpriced attraction that I have ever done in my lifetime was the Empire State Building. I'm like, all you did was take me up an elevator and let me walk around. You didn't even carry me around on your shoulder. It's an elevator an elevator ride, and it was just incredibly expensive, but it was also an experience. Now it's one that I would I don't need to do it again. Uh I, you know, I it was it was absolutely amazing, and it's a memory that I'll have forever. But I don't need to do it again, especially for the price. And then, you know, like I was talking about earlier, you come back from your trip and you spent a little more than you had intended because you got to the destination and there was something new there, and the family was all excited when they saw it, and they really wanted to do it, and the kids are like, Let's do it, let's do it, let's do it. And you want to reward your family, and so you give in, and out comes that little piece of plastic. You know what I'm talking about, and then you get home, and then 30 days later, here comes the bill, and it's like a ghost coming back to haunt you, and so that's why I say it's it it's a double-edged sword. You were able to make the memory, but now that memory is gonna cut like a knife. Now, do I recommend doing that? I can't say that I recommend it, but I can't say that I would ever regret it either. Because if I went somewhere, let's use the Niagara Falls, for example. I'd seen Niagara Falls on TV, I'd seen it in movies, I've seen it on the internet. Taking that boat ride up into the falls was one of the most incredible, awe-inspiring things that I have ever done in my life. While I thought it was a little overpriced, I don't regret it. And even if I had to put it on a credit card, even if I got home and that charge was on a credit card and then I had to figure out how to pay it, I would not regret it. So, what you have to do in that situation is you have to weigh out the risk versus reward for your own financial situation. Because if you got your family with you, you got your kids, you you're not gonna get that back. You're never gonna get that time back. So, in my mind, it would have to be worth it, but I can't speak for everybody. You know, when you talk about the cost of travel and getting somewhere, now this is where I will budget shop until there is no tomorrow. I'll tell you how low I will go on when I fly. I think first class is one of the most overrated things. And those that fly first class are like, uh, I don't know. You gotta fly. I've I've flown first class, and yeah, there's more room and it was more comfortable, but it still got me there. Understand this. I would ride in the overhead bin if they could stuff me in there and it got me to my destination. That is the truth about how I would travel. Now, when it comes to my lodging, yeah, I'm gonna kind of hedge that up a little bit because I don't want to be in some CD room that hasn't been cleaned properly, things like that, especially in these times. Doesn't mean I gotta spend $500 a night because guess what? The $100 room versus the $500 room, it has the same bed and the same toilet and the same TV. And I just I stand by that decision, but you just have to be very, very careful when choosing a room in the the one for the area that it's in and for the cleanliness. That's would be my to if I have to walk a little further to get to an attraction, that's fine. If I have to drag my luggage upstairs instead of an elevator, that's fine. But when it comes to being for safety, that's and that whether healthy or for your health or for just a location, that kind of takes a little more precedence over that. So, what is the true cost of not traveling? I remember my wife shared something with me. She said, Before she she had lived in North Carolina her whole life, and she said, I never regretted traveling until I set out on my own, just her and her daughter, and moved to Texas. This was stepping outside of her comfort zone 100%. And when she figured out that she could do that on her own, it gave her a whole new confidence in traveling in the unknown. And now we've created a monster because she loves traveling just as much as I do. Because some people mistake comfort for happiness, and I'm telling you, you have to step outside of your comfort zone. Because mental images from experience are the only way to have true experience memories. I mean, I've known people that have stayed in their hometown for their entire life, and they will quickly tell you, you know what, I don't care anything about traveling, I don't care anything about going and seeing. I I just all that flying somewhere and the hustle bustle and fighting traffic and fighting lines and fighting the people and and yeah, uh that that just doesn't mean anything to me. And I have seen people firsthand that got an opportunity to travel, and you know what it did? It took that individual that was in their 40s, 50s, and it converted them immediately, right back to the equivalent of when I was seven years old walking through the magic kingdom. You can see it in their eyes, you can see the wonder and the amazement in their facial expressions that they're seeing things that they have never seen before, and they're experiencing things that they have never experienced before. That is travel gold right there. It's someone realizing, well, I was in my comfort zone, and I thought that where I was at was fine, until I got to go experience it. Because until and I use this statement a lot, but if you talk about the Statue of Liberty and you say, I've seen it, where'd you see it? I saw it on the internet, I saw it on TV, I saw it in a movie. But until you've stood at the base and looked up at the Statue of Liberty, you haven't experienced it. And that's the only way to have those memories that last a lifetime. I've seen people step outside their comfort zone and realize that the world is just this amazing place. I'll never forget the first time I took my wife on a cruise. And she had never been to the Caribbean. And it was the first, she had always wanted to take a cruise. And you know me, I'm not really cruise, pro-cruise, but she wanted to go on a cruise. I'm like, let's go on a cruise. And then I'm going to show you the difference. We'll go to an all-inclusive resort on the next time. We were on that ship. And as we're sailing out, and we got to the point where that water turned to that Caribbean blue, she converted immediately to the equivalent of that seven-year-old child walking into the magic kingdom for the first time. Because it was so surreal. That blue water that was just miles deep and it was just so blue beyond imagination, just it matched the sky. And that was the moment that she said, Oh, this is incredible. I want to see more. She had stepped outside of that comfort zone yet one more time. I'm going to close with this. If I woke up tomorrow and all my travel memories were gone, it would be a travesty. I don't even think I could fathom not being able to retrieve my travel memories. And I hope that I never have to come to that realization. But let me tell you, travel is magic, but you gotta go find it. You gotta go look for it, and you gotta believe in it when you find it. Because when you believe in the magic that you found, in all honesty, you're believing in yourself for stepping outside of your comfort zone. Don't forget to caffeinate and conquer. And I'll see you again next week. Thank you for listening. Bye bye.