Changes to our Facebook group: Earth Vagabonds

Last Updated on October 27, 2024 by Ellen

The pandemic has changed everything about travel. It’s changed our lives. It’s changed this blog. Now I will change our Facebook group slightly, as we all work through the new normal.

When we were in Lisbon in 2018, I decided to start a Facebook group mainly to find other people like us. Up to that point, the only people we had met like us – early retired, slow traveling, on a budget – were our dear friends Todd and Damon. I thought: are there others out here like us?

Fellow Earth Vagabonds

The answer is: yes! There are! Our Facebook group Earth Vagabonds enabled us to meet several people as our paths eventually crossed in this big-small world. And we look forward to seeing those people again, and meeting new friends.

So meeting like-minded, authentic, slow travelers was a main reason to start this group. We weren’t vacationers. We weren’t digital nomads. We weren’t house sitters. We weren’t older retirees to a single country. There is nothing wrong with any of those – they just don’t describe us. Nothing available on Facebook described us.

The second big reason I started the group: to exchange information. We had learned a lot by 2018 about how to go vagabonding around Earth. But there is always more to learn.

The information exchange with people we’ve met, and with contributing group members, has really been fantastic. I want more of that, please.

My trusted moderator Chuck has long opined I should restrict membership to serious travelers and not admit casual tourists. To which I answered – maybe the casual tourist will be inspired to be a serious traveler. I could help people help themselves, so to speak. Another reason to start the group: I could inspire people to go further into the local communities in foreign countries and get outside their comfort zones — get outside the tourist zones.

But now I realize: it’s enough to lead by example. I don’t want to push anything on anyone. We will be more selective on the members we admit into the group moving forward.

We believe an authentic, slow travel lifestyle is still possible.

Wear a mask? Yes. Social distance? Yes. Quarantine when required? Yes.

I do, and have done, all of those things. And I’m not sorry: we are not staying home, and we are not “going” home. Especially now. America is an utter disaster. (I’ll save those thoughts for another platform.)

Changes to our Facebook group

If you are already in the group, and you are a vacationer, cruiser, all-inclusive bargain seeker, you are grandfathered in. We won’t boot you out. Of course, you always have the option to leave if you find this renewed group focus just isn’t for you. No hard feelings.

There are five changes to the group.

Three changes are geared at a renewed focus on the original intent of the group:

1. Name change
   • From “Retired budget travelers: Earth Vagabonds” to simply “Earth Vagabonds“
2. Membership questions change
   • Answers to three in-depth travel questions (currently the questions are too easy, and if you don’t have the gumption to answer questions, you likely won’t contribute much to the group)
3. Revised mission statement
   • Shorter, more direct about vagabonding around Earth

Two changes geared for us to lead by example with an authentic slow travel lifestyle in the ‘new normal’:

1. We will post from EarthVagabonds.com, as it relates to the betterment of group engagement
   • Other bloggers cannot post outside the once-a-week thread like we will do.
     • This is a big content change!
2. We will re-instate the Wednesday thread for others to self-promote their blogs, books, vlogs, rental units, etc.
   • This will be called “Where to Wednesday“

As I said, anyone who doesn’t like the changes is free to leave.

Changes to our blog, earthvagabonds.com

Content

We have been writing content every day since we were locked down in the Philippines on March 16, 2020.

We will continue that for now — at least through the completion of the sustainability projects for the Ati, an indigenous tribe we are helping near our two-bedroom apartment rental at the Hangout Beach Resort.

Ads

We redesigned the website in September 2019 when we switched hosting. And we had growing pains with ads covering content. We hope those issues are now worked out.

Remember: this is an independent blog.

We don’t work with affiliates, and we don’t take kickbacks. The ads you see on our pages are from Google Adsense – and Google’s ad bidders decide what you see in your browser – not us.

We do not earn more than a few dollars a month from this decision to run these types of ads.

Questions? Comments?

Please let us know what you think or if you have a question below, or in private on the Contact Us page.

We believe we can continue our lifestyle of authentic, slow travel, although it admittedly will take extra research and a lot of extra patience. But this type of lifestyle is why we retired early – why we made so many of the life decisions we made. We aren’t about to give up now.

Thanks for reading, “Changes to our Facebook group: Earth Vagabonds.”

What to read next:

• What it cost us to live in Lisbon for 1 month
• The cost to slow travel in Penang, Malaysia for 1 month
• Retired budget travel in Rome: 6+ ways to save money